More Unity goodness

Oh, I got a chance to play with some of the new releases - they are so much fun!!

The fabbo Girl of the Moment set - coming soon!!!

And the CUTE CUTE CUTE Incentive set this month for signing up as a new Unity kit club member:


TFL!!

(I design for Unity Stamp Co)

Layout - What do you want to remember?

Just a quick layout with the first picture of us from 2009 - right after new years at 12:01 a.m.....

Using scraps and some old school Heidi Swapp.

TFL. Wendy

Baby Girl Gift Album

I'm busily stocking my Etsy store for the holidays (check out the link on the right bar). Just loaded in a baby girl gift album made from the beautiful PRIMA baby girl line. Perfect for the busy new mom, or as a gift from the busy mom to a grandparent, a godparent, etc... Just add pictures and you're done! 12 internal pages (6 doublesided).












And because I always want to share for a really good price - a scrap pack from the same line, just for you to create cards with, etc... Also loaded into the store...






Have a wonderful saturday!

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Happy thanksgiving everyone!!! Today, I'm thankful for family, friends, health, happiness, peace, good food, a good job, and stretchy pants!! Are you cooking? I'm making a sweet potato dish (thanks to Ree Drummond) and heading to my sister's later....

I'm playing with the new kits this week. The first sentiment stamp is from the Nov 09 KOTM Simply Magical, which I thought fit the girls from the Girl of the Moment kit perfectly....


My second project is all Nov 09 KOTM Simply Magical,


Thanks for stopping by. I hope you have a safe and blessed thanksgiving.


(I design for Unity Stamp Co.)

Tutorial - Layout with every day photo and printed paper

I have a confession. I have always been a hugely patterned paper girl. But unless I am working with a very light, subtle, and neutral background piece, I have a tendency to either defer to the hugely dramatic single photo or the masses and masses of little photos. But sometimes, and especially when working with older (non-digital), I might only have a single photo to work with, one that has sentimental value, but is not otherwise photographically “easy” to scrap.

That’s precisely what happened the other day when, cleaning up, I came across this overexposed single photo of my daughter from our pre-digital days – it was creased and folded and showed much love from baby hands. That expression on her face – so un-posed, so HER back her super curious toddler years. I felt compelled to scrap it as is. I could have scanned it and enlarged it to black and white – but somehow, I felt that would lose some of the feel of the photo. And so, it was original all the way.

For my first choice, I reached for the obvious – the super cute “Camped Out” paper release from Bella Blvd. I mean, it had lots of cute fish in it!! I thought it looked ok – very warm – the browns in the photo pulled the earth tones from the paper nicely.



But somehow, the photo felt like it was disappearing into the paper and the energy did not feel right. So, looking at my photo, I found my eye drawn to the gorgeous blues in the Beta Fish – oh… that might work with the blues and oranges from Kaiser Craft’s Offshore. It was an unconventional choice – but why not?

Wow. The whole feel changed. This was no longer warm and fuzzy:


The brown stood out against the blue/oranges and conveyed a nice energy. The browns in the photo complimented the subtle oranges in the paper. Since this was a 4x6 photo, if the photo gets lost, size the layout down to a 8.5x11 landscape format (vs. 12x12) to keep the scale.

First, pick a background piece – something not too heavily printed. With this line, there was no completely “subtle” obvious back piece. But even with the flourish die cut down at the bottom right there, the picture was still getting lost in all those circular lines in the backpiece, and the edges just kind of floated.



A blue border around the edges, and a solid blue line in the middle anchored the layout.



Still, the photo was still disappearing…. Let’s try a white mat.



Better. But still a bit off. Pull in a little of the orange with a narrow orange mat



That looks good. Now its counteracting the orange curves. But it’s still too blue…. Find another orange element for another anchor. The orange tag works.



Now for the title. Coloring the plastic AC Thickers with Copics yields a pretty watery look. Since Copics are an alcohol ink – it works and is permanent.




Almost done...




It still feels unfinished. It needs some more visual anchors, and some texture for interest. Using the triangle design principle, add elements up top and to the left, for a visual triangle. Ahhh, I like it. :)

farewell to the best scrapbook store on the web

Last week, I learned that lifetimemoments was going to close its doors at the end of this year. I have been blessed to have been designing for LM for many years now - since September, 2005. To say that I love the store, and its owners Jackie and Thad, is an understatement. They are the epitome of grace and generosity, and ran Lifetimemoments with kindness, beauty and love. I am so sad for what the closing represents for Jackie and Thad, although I am 100% confident that life has good things in store for them that will unfold as they move forward. I will miss the community, and the closeness of our design team. We have celebrated babies, promotions, adoptions, moves, marriages, deployments and safe returns, birthdays, and everything else possible in between. While we will always stay in touch and be friends, a part of me recognizes that it will not be the same and how much I will miss logging in every day for my LM fix. I was telling my DH how it felt like someone close to me died. How crazy is that? But my beloved LM. How I will miss you. I wish Jackie and Thad the very very best.

For everyone - there is an awesome liquidation sale going on through December 10. Be sure to stop by Lifetimemoments.

Unity Nov 09 Store Kit

Good Saturday morning everyone!!! Today, Unity's playing with the November 09 STORE kit of the month - Believe In Fairytales. The Store kit is exclusive to the stores that carry it - check out the list where you can get yours...



I got to play with this cute Owl image - what an adorable sentiment!!





Thanks for stopping by today. Be sure to check out the other DT gals' blogs for other samples made from the kit. Have a wonderful weekend!

(I design for Unity Stamp Co)

Tutorial - Get Well Soon Soup Holder

We are knee deep in cold and flu season, and there are little sickie bugs going around everywhere. Here is a tutorial for a little "care package" to send to wish good health. (You will need one of those chicken soup mix packets from the grocery store).

Cut 12x12 cardstock to 11"x 5.5". Keep that 1" strip on the side.



Score it at 2.75" and 7.75"



Take your scrap 1" strip and adhere it to the top of your soup envelope packet.

Trim off the overhang on the left and right edges. Set aside.


Color your Rubber Romance stamp (Bunny Girl), and set aside.



Now, take your scored card, and adhere something to that left edge to give it some interest. I added a paper frill. Adhere a large flower, then on top of that, a button to the right flap. Adhere another button to the left flap. These buttons will be the base for your string tie closure for the packet.

On TOP of those buttons, now adhere two more flowers.
Embellish those flowers with anything you want to. I used more buttons.

Weight it down with something heavy til it dries.

Take your soup packet, adhere to the inside of your card, and add the cooking instructions.

Adhere your rubber romance image to the left side of the card. Use twine to close the packet just like a regular string closure (wrap one end of twine around left button, wrap other end of twine around right button)






Here's the finished project. Enjoy. Thanks for stopping by today. Wendy



(I design for Rubber Romance Stamps)